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POEMS OF BELIEF. With frontispiece. i2mo, 
^i.oo net. Postage 7 cents. 

THE >£NEID OF VIRGIL, translated into English 
verse. 8vo, $1.50, tut. Postage, 15 cents. 

THE ELEGIES OF TIBULLUS, translated into 
English verse. 8vo, 90 cents, net. Postage, 8 
cents. 

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
Boston and New York 



POEMS OF BELIEF 



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POEMS OF BELIEF 



BY 



THEODORE C. WILLIAMS 



WITH A FRONTISPIECE 
BY ELIHU VEDDER 




BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 



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COPYRIGHT, I9IO, BY THEODORE C. WILLIAMS 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



Published April iqio 



<3|ft from 
th^ Islate of Wiss Ruth Putnam 
Oct.6.1931 



DEDICATION 

Ere our waking loves begun, 
Dreams alone to sqng gave wing; 
Thou at last discovered, won, 
Hast thy part in all I sing. 

Though my songs appear to rove. 
Never could they rove from thee. 
When the theme was less than love. 
Love beside me struck the key. 



CONTENTS 

THE LILY AND THE PINE . . . . . 1 

MY SHELL 2 

THE VOYAGE OF LIFE ..... 3 

THE TRUE PRIEST 4 

A PRAYER FOR LIFE 5 

THE SINGING SOUL 6 

ALL IN ALL ....... 7 

THY BROTHER . 8 

MY FRIEND 9 

A THANATOPSIS 10 

TWICE GIVEN 11 

PASTOR BONUS 12 

A LENTEN SECRET 13 

THE FREE SPIRIT 14 

THE WINTER VICTORY 15 

STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS 16 

THE SILENT HOUR 17 

THE ENDLESS QUEST 18 

THE AUTUMNAL HOPE 19 

[ vii ] 



CONTENTS 

A SABBATH EVENING 20 

THE OFFENDING 21 

BENEDICTION . . . . . . , 23 

GOD IN ALL 24 

THE FELLOW LABORERS 25 

THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD . . . .26 

THY HEART IN CHAMBERS TWAIN ... 27 

POSSESSION 28 

HOSPITALITY 29 

DEMOCRACY 30 

man's infinity 31 

NOVEMBER . 32 

THE THESEUS OF THE PARTHENON ... 33 

MY HOST .34 

THE SOUL IN BONDAGE 35 

GIBRALTAR 36 

IN A TIME OF NATIONAL SCANDAL ... 37 

^NEAS 38 

TO VIRGIL 39 

TO DEATH 40 

THE EARTH CELESTIAL 41 

TO A POET WHO FEARED THE LOSS OF YOUTH 42 

BOUNDLESSNESS 43 

[ viii ] 



CONTENTS 

RESURRECTIO CARNIS 45 

A SOUL IN STORM 46 

THE SPHINX 47 

THE ROYAL SELF 49 

SURSUM CORDA 51 

IMMORTAL MIND 53 

HERAKLEITOS 55 

LAGO DI COMO 57 

AT A TUSCAN VILLA 59 

THE DREAM-BUILDER 61 

RETRO SATHANAS 63 

AVE ROMA IMMORTALIS 66 

A stoic's creed 69 

SENECA ON THE SOUL 71 

THE ROXBURY LATIN SCHOOL . . . .74 

TO OUR OLD HEAD-MASTER .... 76 

INDEPENDENCE DAY 78 

TO JAPAN VICTORIOUS 80 

THE MAKING OF MAN 83 



[ « ] 



POEMS OF BELIEF 

THE LILY AND THE PINE 

I FOUND a lily near my door 

Which bloomed an hour, then bloomed no more; 

And her pure-hearted perfectness 

My heart did bless. " 

I saw high up the mountain cold 
A pine a hundred winters old; 
For his strong-hearted patience there 
I breathed a prayer. 

O hour of sweetly breathing life ! 

century of strength and strife! 

1 only know that in each one 

God's will was done. 



[ 1 ] 



MY SHELL 

A SHELL upon the sounding sands 
Flashed in the sunshine where it lay. 

Its green disguise I tore; my hands 
Bore the rich treasure-trove away. 

Within, the chamber of the pearl 

Blushed like the rose, like opal glowed; 

And o'er its domes a cloudy swirl 

Of mimic waves and rainbows flowed. 

"Strangely," I said, "the artist-worm 
Has made his secret bower so bright! 
This jeweller, this draftsman firm 
Was born and died in eyeless night. 

"Deep down in many-monstered caves 
His miracle of beauty throve; 
Far from all light, against strong waves, 
A Castle Beautiful he wove. 

" Take courage, soul ! Thy labor blind 
The lifting tides may onward bear 
To some glad shore, where thou shalt find 
Light, and a Friend to say, 'How fair!'" 
[ 2 ] 



THE VOYAGE OF LIFE 

Life is a voyage. The winds of life come strong 
From every point ; yet each will speed thy course along. 
If thou with steady hand when tempests blow. 
Canst keep thy course aright and never once let go. 

Life is a voyage. Ask not the port unknown 
Whither thy Captain guides his storm-tossed vessel on ; 
Nor tremble thou lest mast should snap and reel; 
But note his orders well, and mind, unmoved, thy wheel. 

Life's voyage is on the vast, unfathomed sea 
Whereof the tides are times, the shores, eternity; 
Seek not with plummet, when the great waves roll, 
But by the stars in heaven mark which way sails thy 
soul. 



[ 3 ] 



THE TRUE PRIEST^ 

Lord, who dost the voices bless 
Crying in the wilderness. 
And the lovely gifts increase 
Of the messengers of peace. 
Thou, whose temple is with men, 
Show us Thy true priest again. 

In the holy place may he 
Thine immediate presence see; 
Or through deserts, Father, led. 
Show Thy people heavenly bread. 
While his lips at Thy control 
Warn, instruct, inspire, console. 

Give him to his priestly dress 
Faith and zeal and righteousness. 
Then, lest all Thy gifts be lost. 
Breathe Thy gift of Pentecost, — 
Love, whose many-languaged fire 
Finds each listening soul's desire. 
^ Ordination Hymn. Tune "Refuge." 



[ 4 ] 



A PRAYER FOR LIFE 

Be with me. Lord ! My house is growing still, 
As one by one the guests go out the door; 

And some who helped me once to do Thy will 
Behold and bless Thee on the Heavenly Shore. 

Uphold my strength ! My task is not yet done. 

Nor let me at the labor cease to sing; 
But from the rising to the setting sun. 

Each faithful hour, do service to my king. 

Show me Thy light ! Let not my wearied eyes 
Miss the fresh gladness of life's passing day. 

But keep the light of morn, the sweet surprise 
Of each new blessing that attends my way. 

And for the crowning grace, O Lord, renew 
The best of gifts Thy best of saints have had : 

With the great joy of Christ my heart endue, 
To share the whole world's tears and still be glad. 



[ 5 ] 



THE SINGING SOUL 

A hundred leagues of land and sea, 

A boundless reach of sky, 
Closed round the singing soul of me. 

And woke this glad reply. 

I marvel what such vast expense 

Of power is nourished by, 
And how my microcosmic sense 

Such height and depth can spy. 

Yet where my eyes the fragments scan. 

Or view the glorious whole, 
I find free harmony with man. 

And truth that feeds his soul. 

Not all your powers, earth, sky, and sea. 

My watchful heart appall : 
The same just laws guard you and me, 

One life sustains us all. ' 



[ 6 ] 



ALL IN ALL 

Evert atom gives resistance not the universe can 

break ; 
Each rose-petal holds perfection angel artists could not 

make. 

As each white wave feels the motion of the moon-led, 

tidal main, 
Plato and the seven sages shine in every human brain. 

Each true prayer foretastes the glory saints and pro- 
phets burn to teach; 

In my brother's heart enfolded lies the kingdom Christ 
would reach. 

Under every power and passion stirs the element divine : 
If I grasp the moment's meaning, all eternity is mine. 



[ 7 ] 



THY BROTHER* 

When thy heart with joy o'er-flowing 

Sings a thankful prayer. 
In thy joy, O let thy Brother 
With thee share. 

When the harvest sheaves ingathered 

Fill thy barns with store. 
To thy God and to thy Brother 
Give the more. 

If thy soul with power uplifted 

Yearn for glorious deed. 
Give thy strength to serve thy Brother 
In his need. 

Hast thou borne a secret sorrow 

In thy lonely breast ? 
Take to thee thy sorrowing Brother 
For a guest. 

Share with him thy bread of blessing. 

Sorrow's burden share. 
When thy heart enfolds a Brother, 
God is there. 

^ Tune ''Geneva." 
[ 8 ] 



MY FRIEND 

A FRIEND I had who, when his heart was cold. 
Warmed it, he said, with Hfe-enkindling wine, 
Made from no mortal grape, but of a vine 

Planted by Christ and never waxing old. 

This wondrous man, when wearily and slow 

A comrade walked, would make his shoulders bare 
And whisper, " Brother, put thy burden there." 

He walked, he said, with Christ, and rested so. 

Then one black day I knew my friend must die. 

I wept and strove. My heart was torn in twain. 

But he ! — he smiled like heaven upon my pain 
And said, "Would God thou wert as blest as I." 



[ 9 ] 



A THANATOPSIS 

Death is an angel with two faces: 

To us he turns 

A face of terror, blighting all things fair; 

The other burns 

With glory of the stars, and love is there; 

And angels see that face in heavenly places. 

Two strong, sharp swords are in the hands of Death: 

One smites to dust 

Dear beauty's idol and the thrones of power. 

And long, sweet years in that brief, awful hour 

Vanish because they must; 

His other and his stronger sword is just: 

It slays untruth, and mocks at this world's lust, — 

O liberating Death! 

Strive, O my soul, to see 

The heavenly face and that delivering sword ! 

Till I shall be 

All truly fashioned to th' Incarnate Word, 

And live, not knowing death, in Thee, O Lord ! 



[ 10 ] 



TWICE GIVEN 

God gave the world His Son ; and he was known 

For God's own Son, because he took the throne 

Of perfect love that seeketh not her own. 

And giving freely, as to him was given. 

Made love on Earth commune with love in Heaven. 

A perfect gift thy Father gives to thee, — 
Thyself, with all thy powers : yet all will be 
Imperfect, weak and in captivity. 
Till thou. His child, give all thyself away 
To God and to thy brother, day by day. 



[ 11 ] 



PASTOR BONUS 

A WHITE young lamb upon my breast I bore : 
My arms are empty now; and through my tears 

O'er a wide river, on a shining shore, 

Another Shepherd with my lamb appears. 

Each evening safely in his fold she lies; 

And every day, through pastures green and fair. 
Follows her Shepherd under sunny skies, — 

And all the flock of Christ walk with her there. 

A flock unnumbered ! Yet each star above 

With differing glory fills the heavenly frame, — 

And my white lamb, in those vast realms of love. 
The Shepherd knows and calls her by her name. 



[ 12 ] 



A LENTEN SECRET 

I STRUGGLED with my burden, till one day 
I strove no longer: then it fell away. 

I nursed my wounds in vain with skilful balm; 
Not till I nursed them not my flesh grew calm. 

My heaviest cross I weeping would not bear; 
I lifted it, and lo ! 't was light as air ! 

Askest thou how such troubles so could bless ? 
God touched each one, — and it was nothingness. 



t 13 ] 



THE FREE SPIRIT 

There is no fate: 

Thy high or low estate 
Comes of thy climbing or thy falling down. 

No baleful star 

A brave man's bliss can bar; 
No kingly planet keep a coward's crown. 

Dost thou complain 

Because God's frost and rain 
To thy white cheek seem much too wet or cold ? 

Dost thou not know 

God's angels, rain and snow, 
Swathe earth in robes of silver, fold on fold ? 

Cease, luckless man, 

To curse thy being's plan ! 
For wert thou to thine own true birthright true, 

Thou wert set free. 

As are the winds, the sea. 
Or eagles mounting in the trackless blue. 



i 14 il 



THE WINTER VICTORY 

We are not children of the sun, 

With myrtle garlands glad and gay. 

Who weep when Summer's mirth is done 
And fling the pipes of Pan away. 

The conquerors of a land of snow. 
We fear not Winter's leafless time; 

Swift winds and flames, our servants, go 
To fetch us flowers of every clime. 

Beneath the steadfast northern star 
Our blazing hearthstone never fails. 

Where heart to heart draws closer far 
Than lovers in Arcadian vales. 

Not ours to meet the Winter's birth 
With sighs, but with fresh tasks begun. 

We rule the many-seasoned earth; 
We are not children of the sun. 



[ 15 ] 



STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS 

Father, to-day 
I humbly pray 
Into no sin my hasty feet may stray. 

My wilfulness. 
Till Thou shalt bless. 
Cannot sustain me in true holiness. 

My boasted might 
To choose the right. 
Forgetting Thee, my God, is mean and slight. 

My wing of love 
Not aimed above 
Goes trailing in the mire and is not love. 

My sight, my power. 
My love's brief hour 
Are loss and dross, until some starry dower 

From Heaven shall shine 
On what seems mine. 
And bless poor me with light and life divine. 

[ 16 ] 



THE SILENT HOUR^ 

As the storm retreating 
Leaves the vales in peace. 

Let the world's vain noises 
O'er our spirits cease. 

Sounds of wrath and striving, 

Man with man at war. 
Hearts with Heaven contending, - 

Hear we now no more. 

Now the hours of stillness 
Wondrous visions show; 

Heaven unfolds before us. 
Angels come and go. 

Holy, human faces. 

From earth's shadows free. 
Look with love upon us. 

Bid us patient be. 

Almost we discern them. 
Almost read their smile. 

Almost hear them saying — 
"Wait a little while," 

Thus in hours of stillness 
Faith to Heaven shall rise, 

Till death's last, deep silence 
Quite unseals our eyes. Amen. 
1 Tune " Merrial." 

[ 17 ] 



THE ENDLESS QUEST 

Ere true love its love can tell. 
Ere fond hope flies half its range, 
Trembling in the marriage-bell 
Sobs an undertone of change. 

Glory toiled for, fought for, won, 
Name and fame and conquest proud. 
Ere the conqueror's day be done. 
Melt like mad Ixion's cloud. 

Man was born on earth to roam, 
Dream-struck, dazed, and self-beguiled, 
Toward his migratory home 
In th' unnamed, unchartered wild. 

Could one man the realms possess 

Of his visionary eye. 

He would perish of excess, 

Or of disenchantment die. 



[ 18 ] 



THE AUTUMNAL HOPE 

Though the autumn's dying glory- 
Flames along the lordly hill, 
Love will tell no mournful story, 
Faith not feel the season's chill. 

Leaves may fall, but all their fading 
Steals no life of living tree. 
Still, through deeper cells pervading. 
Thrills the life we cannot see. 

Hush, my heart, thy fancies dreary! 
Autumn's sadness is a cheat. 
Forests rest when they are weary, 
But their winter sleep is sweet. 

Buds beneath the branches dreaming, 
Roots that slumber in the snow. 
Whisper, " Death is but a seeming. 
Life the only truth we know." 



[ 19 ] 



A SABBATH EVENING 

I THANK thee, Lord, that just to-day 
I have not seemed to go astray, 
And that to-night the setting sun 
Shines only on my duty done. 

Father! not thus Thy name I bless 
From proud or blind self -righteousness; 
Nor that I thus would hope to win 
Remission of some wilful sin. 

But if to-night I lift my eyes 
Unto the all-beholding skies. 
And seem to feel within me shine 
Some kinship with their calm divine, — 

The silent blessing bids me pray. 
By this one glad and blameless day. 
To learn what all my days might be. 
If each were holy unto Thee. 



[ 20 ] 



THE OFFENDING 

{After George Herbert) 

Pluck out my heart ! 'T is a stale piece of food 

shame ! — 
Unfit for Thee to taste. 
Take it, my God, at last. 

And frame 
A fair and good. 

Why is it that my heart should not be set 
On Thee ? 
I hasten to draw near, 
And ere I be aware, 

1 flee. 

O spare me yet ! 

My deeds which should be pageants to declare 
Thy praise, 
Do mock Thy mighty love. 
My God, when shall Thy Dove 
My ways 
Make straight and fair ? 

[ 21 ] 



THE OFFENDING 

Once did I think my furious eagle-soul 
Had eyes 
To stare upon the sun. 
My God, what have I done ? 
Thy skies 
I have made foul. 

Blind eyes were better than this sight of smart. 
My sin. 
O make me blind, sick, dumb ! 
Then lest rebellion come 
Within, 
Pluck out my heart. 



[ 22 ] 



BENEDICTION 

God be with thee ! Gently o 'er thee 
May His wings of mercy spread ; 

Be His way made plain before thee, 
And His glory round thee shed. 

Safely onward, 
May thy pilgrim-feet be led. 

God be with thee ! With thy spirit 
His abiding presence be; 

Till thy heart that peace inherit, 
God alone can give to thee. 

His indwelling, 
Help, and heal, and set thee free. 



[ 23 ] 



GOD IN ALL 

The flowing Soul, nor low nor high, 

Is perfect here, is perfect there. 
Each drop in ocean orbs the sky, 

And seeing eyes make all things fair. 

The evening cloud, the wayside flower 
Surpass the Andes and the rose; 

And wrapped in every hasty hour 
Is all the lengthened year bestows. 

Therefore erase thy false degrees. 

From stock and stone strike starry fire. 

Lo ! even in the least of these 

Dwells the Lord Christ, the world's desire. 



[ 24 ] 



THE FELLOW LABORERS 

Not a star our eyes can see 
Shines alone for you and me; 
Distant worlds behold its light. 
Ages hence 't will shine as bright. 

Not a flower that breathes and blows 
Just for us its perfume throws; 
Hosts of happy insect things 
Brush it with their quickening wings. 

Brooks, as from the hills they flow. 
Make green meadows as they go; 
Cataracts of wrathful sound 
Turn the mill-wheels round and round. 

Each strong thing some service gives 
Far and wide; and nothing lives 
For itself or just its own : 
'T is but death to live alone. 



[ 25 ] 



THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD 

Out of a vanishing cloud 

And the wind-blown dust that flies, 
God made a human heart, endowed 

With light from the central skies. 

'T was cast on a furious flood 
Of a million changeful things, 

And fever and fear consumed its blood : — 
But the creature was born with wings. 

The wings were a banner of flame 

Among the stars unfurled; 
And the Light in Man at the last became 

The light of the whole round world. 



I 26 3 



THY HEART IN CHAMBERS TWAIN 

(From the German) 

Thy heart in chambers twain 

Doth shelter 
Two neighbors, Joy and Pain. 

If Joy be wide awake. 

Her neighbor 
A longed-for rest will take. 

O Joy, if thou be wise, 

Step lightly, 
Lest Pain from sleep arise. 



[ 27 ] 



POSSESSION 

Let not my own my owner be. 
Possessions, if they serve not me, 
Are golden-chained captivity. 



[ 28 ] 



HOSPITALITY 

In vain my host at banquet free 
Gives far-fetched fruit and wine; 
If soul to soul he meets not me, 
On beggar's crust I dine. 



[ 29 ] 



DEMOCRACY 

The kings are drones, the angered people cried. 
The strong have gagged us, robbed us, and their eyes 
Are blinded. Let the people's wit be tried ! 
Much work and little bread have made us wise. 



[ 30 i 



MAN'S INFINITY 

To mete and sway a bounded sphere 
With patient heart and free. 
And harvest all his Now and Here, 
Is Man's infinity. 



I 31 ] 



NOVEMBER 

The bare November, like a stern divine. 
Frowned on my soul, discoursing of decay, 
Of time, flesh, dust, and pleasure's hasty day. 

Reiterating weary line on line 

Death's threadbare homily. " O Nature mine," 

I cried in wrath, " thou who didst breathe last May 
The spirit of gladness in young lambs at play. 

Show thyself potent yet, by one sure sign." 

Then the moon rose. I saw her, full and calm, 
Move through the large clouds, as a mother might 
From room to room where sleeping children lie. 
" My son," she said to me, "since yesternight 
I made my blissful round through Italy, 

From far Cathay and silvered isles of palm." 



[ 32 ] 



THE THESEUS OF THE PARTHENON 

'T IS the scarred ruin of a god-like face. 
Lost, lost forever, tlie proud light it wore! 
The limbs, the robe are lovely as of yore; 
The lordly neck still keeps an awful grace; 
The clear brows front us still without a trace 
Of earth's imperf ectness : while we deplore 
That men of our frail mould may blend no more 
Man's self-poised strength with god-like charm and 

peace. 
Yet even the ruin speaks. That beauteous mien 
Of Theseus, hero of a vanished prime. 

Would look on Athens only while she bred 
Men valorous and youth high-souled and clean; 
He blessed all Hellas through her golden time, 
Then veiled those eyes from Greeks enslaved and 
dead. 



[ 33 ] 



MY HOST 

A GUEST was I. My Host lived rich and free; 
Feasts, gardens, music, guests of noble name. 
Sweet sleep, good talk, gay youth and lovely dame, — 

All made my pleasures. Said my Host to me: 

"The house is yours. I bid its servants be 
Quick to obey you. Make increasing claim 
Of all your heart can wish. It is my aim 

These guests of mine shall use whate'er they see." 

Then some one said : " Since here we have such powers, 
All is our own ; and better place it were 
Could we forget this potent Master nigh, 
And feast unwatched of his all-seeing eye." 

Through all the guests great trouble then did stir: 
And voices cried, "This house is God's, not ours." 



[ 34 ] 



THE SOUL IN BONDAGE 

{See Frontisyiece) 

I SAW a heaven-born soul, whose earthly frame 
Was strength and beauty. But about her twined 
Loose-woven bonds; and slave-like she resigned 

Her limbs to hopeless sleep, which seemed the same 

As coming death; nor felt she any shame 

Of bonds and nakedness, but locked her mind 
In her unopening eyes, and, wilful blind. 

Saw not behind her the sun's orb of flame. 

For groping at her bonds, she said, "They hold 
The skies from which I fell." Yet her own hand 
Held immortality. I could but see 
Her bonds were gossamer; and I was told 

That she must feel her strength some day, and stand 
Unbound, awake, her heavenly wings set free. 



[ 35 ] 



GIBRALTAR 

Dost thou, great England, guard thy greatness here 
By thy bold Lion Rock's imperial pride. 
Only that thy swift merchant ships may ride. 

Encircling the rich globe, without a fear 

Of any wrath but heaven's ? Dost thou uprear 
These bastions in mere greed ? Hast thou defied 
Navies of many kings and multiplied 

Thy strongholds in all seas, that year by year 

Only thine English greatness might increase? 
Not so, Gibraltar ! Let thy fortress stand 
To keep the oceans free, and hold each land 

In righteous brotherhood with all, till Peace, 
At last uplifting her resistless hand. 

Shall bid the nations from their discord cease. 



[ 36 ] 



IN A TIME OF NATIONAL SCANDAL 

Her own sons shamed my country with much gold : 
The lavish gifts her own full bounty gave 
Imperilled what our sires brought o'er the wave 
Of freedom and of faith in God. Men told 
In lands where lords, priests, slaves and monarchs hold 
The soul in chains, that freedom could not save 
Our new-world men from sinking in that grave 
Where over Babylon or Rome have rolled 
The oblivious centuries. We knew and blushed. 
Yet the great people's heart was in the way 
Of wisdom ever. Fortune's pampered son 
May wander or go mad. But in the hushed 
Most holy temple where men love, toil, pray, 
In common manhood, freedom's cause is won. 



[ 37 ] 



iENEAS 

If after kingdoms lost, dark griefs and shames, 
Storms and sad exile, some stern power pursues 
The sacred hero still; yet may the Muse 

In his prophetic heart evoke the names 

Of mightier, more benignant gods: she claims 
Consolatory office, to infuse 
Faith in the future and high heart to use 

The present task, though base, for kingly aims. 

Nor is it least of her good gifts to show 
The exile among alien shores and seas, 

How human hearts are touched by human tears 
Even in unknown eyes. For strangers know 

If men have toiled and wept, and make with these 
Concord of song the Muse approving hears. 



[ 38 ] 



TO VIRGIL 

Thy Rome died many deaths. Her native power 
By slow diseases, such as nations know 
When liberty is lost, became a show 

And pageantry for slaves ; then came the hour 

Of outward death, as when a withered flower 
Falls in a tempest; o'er her lying low 
The barbarous legions in resistless flow 

Rained seas of death on temple, street and tower. 

But thou, imperial Virgil, couldst not die. 

Still through strange seas thy storm- tossed Trojans 
fare ; 
Thy visions live; thy voice is singing still. 
We wanderers to a vaster West descry 

New worlds, new sorrows : but true hearts that bear 
The sacred past, seek Heaven's prophetic will. 



[ 39 ] 



TO DEATH 

Why art thou blind, O Death ? Why dost thou choose 
At random whither thy keen shaft is flung ? 
Gray-bearded crime and virtue dying young 

Look all alike to thee. Thou dost confuse 

Th' oppressor with his prey; fond love may lose 
Its loveliest; or justest hate be stung 
By its long-lingering object. With what tongue 

Canst thou, fool Death ! thy frenzied strokes excuse ? 

But haply thy dark wisdom would make scorn 
Of mortal judgments, and would loudly say : 
" Nothing is sure ; nor beauty, wit, nor worth 
Have long to stay. Oh, therefore, sons of Earth, 
Draw close, clasp hands, give life's best gifts away. 
And ere love passes, prove why love was born." 



[ 40 ] 



THE EARTH CELESTIAL 

Roll, little Earth, along thy star-lit round ! 

Light at the sun thine own quenched lamp of power ! 

Thy slow-evolving age and swiftest hour 
Are measured by the light that knows no bound. 
What if thou borrow all ? No stir, nor sound. 

Nor life, nor spark of thought, but is the dower 

Of thy celestial birth; thy least field-flower 
Is fed by stars across the gulf profound. 

Thy beauty never of itself was bred ; 

By their star-clock thy seasons punctual be. 

Let fading centuries pass ! Old Earth in thee 
Let land and ocean hide their millions dead ! 

On with the stars, swift globe ! Thy warm dust rolls 

Through the same sky that breathed thee full of 
souls. 



[ 41 1 



TO A POET WHO FEARED THE LOSS OF 

YOUTH 

Dost thou forebode the passing of the morn 
While yet thy rose of youth is wet with dew ? 
Doth thy fresh laurel twine itself with yew. 

And when thou shouldst be glad, art thou forlorn ? 

Or is there on thy lip some curve of scorn. 
Seeing how meanly men grow old, how few 
But feel the world's false kiss has worked them rue. 

Like Samson by Delilah mocked and shorn ? 

Follow the Muses, brother! They endow 

With youth immortal; and give equal praise 

To gray Mseonides of sightless eyes, 

Or flushed youth singing life's first wild surprise. 

Honor each Muse! But mark Urania's brow 

Lifting unruffled o'er our lapse of days ! 



[ 42 ] 



BOUNDLESSNESS 

(" La Nature est prodigue, non parce-qu'elle est folle, mais parce 
qu'elle est riche.") 

So many seeds that will not grow ! 
So many planets black and bare! 
So many creatures writhing slow 
Through lives which seem dumb chaos, where 
Wild, empty dreams drift on in aimless flow ! 

Unnumbered life-engendering beams 
Speed forth from every potent star; 
But most are lost, — mere pin-point gleams 
Whose light is quenched by travelling far. 
What goal or gain the boundless waste redeems ? 

Hath Nature, who with sparing hand 
Weighs out each morsel to the worm, 
Like madmen building towers of sand, 
Bound fast her parts in form and term. 
But for the whole mere dull confusion planned ? 

Why hold I in my sanest mind 
Such faith in Nature's wise excess ? 
Why does my soul, so small, so blind. 
Glory so much in boundlessness ? 
Why ask I not that heaven have one star less ? 
[ 43 ] 



BOUNDLESSNESS 

Oh, what if this exuberant whole, 
O'er-leaping measure, mark and bound. 
Be subject to unseen control? 
What if all lost notes gathered up shall sound 
God's endless music to Man's deathless soul ? 



[ 44 ] 



RESURRECTIO CARNIS 

O LIVING flesh I call my own, 

My portion brief of earth and air. 

Men bring thee bread from every zone 
And fetch from far thy substance rare. 

The dew of morning fills thy veins, 
The cool, salt sea within thee flows. 

The sunbeam's throb thy heart sustains. 
Thy blush is fellow to the rose. 

Thou hast no commerce with decay, 
Thine elements are star-fed fires, 

Each frail breath of thy mortal day 
From boundless life its life respires. 

O living flesh, what wilt thou be 
When my brief tenancy is done ? 

Still shalt thou not in earth or sea 
Take golden tribute of the sun ? 

So kindred to what will not die, 

Dear flesh, I scorn thy doubts and fears. 
Thy mortal portents pass me by 

And melt in God's eternal years. 
[ 45 ] 



A SOUL IN STORM 

Continually stirred man's soul must be 

By agonies, by whirlwinds of desire. 

Lest it should stagnate, lest the living flow 

Of elemental power should be cut off 

Both from its fount and goal. Oh, what is death? 

'T is the last tempest in life's little pool 

To rouse it to the depth, until it burst 

Its inland bound and flow forth upon tides 

That sweep unmeasured to the utmost shore 

Of God's last star, so finding rest at last. 

Rest ? Who can tell if rest indeed be gain ? 

Who fears great storms, fears what shall surely blow 

If oceans he would cross : and if my soul 

From star to star would travel, if I be 

Not land-locked ever in earth's transient haven, 

Must I not pray God, not for peace and calm. 

But to sail storm-proof o' His vaster seas ? 



[ 46 ] 



k 



THE SPHINX 

Out of the changeful fury of the tide-rifts stream- 
ing by 

Wilt build thee, O World, a place of peace, and show 
God by and by? 

Or all the riot of roses and the loves that escape 
control, 
Are they rainbows shed on a melting cloud from the 
central sun of my soul ? 



O musical storms and stars, do ye strike wild chords 

unplanned ? 
Or is there a master-musician, who leads with 

uplifted hand ? 
If a god's will shape the heavens, is he perfect, 

boundless, free ? 
Or feels he the bondage of violent dust? Does he 

suffer and strive like me ? 



I know that I never shall answer the riddles that 

haunt the mind. 
I see but a spark of the infinite flame, — to all the 

rest born blind. 

[ *7 i 



THE SPHINX 

Yet envy I not tlie gazers who boast of their clearer 
sight; 
For safer I walk if I know I am blind, than calling the 
darkness light. 

For all my riddle unanswered, for all my blindness 

known, 
I would rather keep asking the secret than to make it 

all my own. 
I believe that the stir of the questions is the spirit's 

ultimate breath. 
All life is a passionate question. Wilt thou not answer 

it, Death? 



t 4& ] 



THE ROYAL SELF 

If to this earth from some superior star 
My spirit fell, and if, as Plato dreamed. 
My task is to recover from afar 
The vigor lost, from servitude redeemed, 

It were not hard to bear the darkened day. 

Or not impossible to find once more. 

Though blind, though bleeding, the returning way, 

And hope for home upon this alien shore. 

Or if I be the heir of victor-beast. 
And, born of victory, may hopeful strive. 
Because ascent is life: so at the least, 
I think I could sustain my soul alive. 

But I refuse to drift. I will not be 

A bubble on a stream of stars, to dance. 

To eddy round and shine like something free. 

Then burst my film of being at a chance. 

Yes, I refuse. The powers beyond my ken 
May laugh as tyrants do upon a slave. 
My will may be delusion, and we men 
May at the last snatch nothing from the grave. 

[ 49 ] 



THE ROYAL SELF 

Yet in this moment that I call my own, 
This flash-light life of mine shall be a thing 
Colored by my souFs act. If this brief throne 
Must fall, — at least I '11 use it like a king. 



I 50 ] 



SURSUM CORDA 

Not a star a moment stays; 

Every beam it gives replaces 

Starry beams of vanished days 

Into endless darkness sped. 

The lifted Alp's perpetual head 

Crumbles away, and every storm defaces 

Some fragment of its fiery prime; 

The mountain granite yields to time 

Surely as blown roses fail, 

Or the cheek of youth turns pale. 

Or o'er the poet's would-be deathless rhyme 

Oblivious years prevail. 

Why, then, O my frivolous soul ! 

Sue or execrate the skies, 

If visibly before thy wrathful eyes 

Some mansion melt which once thou couldst 

control ? 
Shall the fading rainbow grieve thee ? 
Or if lovely music leave thee. 
Wilt thou curse it as it goes ? 
Wilt thou in scorn 
Keep the thorn. 

And trample fiercely on a faded rose ? 
[ 51 ] 



SURSUM CORDA 

Rather thou shalt be aware, 

As life's apparition flows, 

Of earth and sky whence thou didst pluck thy 

rose; 
Of a boundless wealth and free 
That can a million-fold repair 
The broken beauty that now grieveth thee. 

Battle lost, or battle won. 

Glorious the conflict done. 

Go, rainbows ! I have found the sun. 



I 52 ] 



IMMORTAL MIND 

What are centuries or aeons, but as flowers that bloom 

and die? 
What is earth ? One planet-blossom in the garden of 

the sky. 
What is Man? OTime! O Planet! Shall he ripen by 

and by? 



Through the formless deep, they tell us, ere the spheres 
in order ran. 

Stirred a beam, a breath of godhead, dawned a demi- 
urgic plan, 

While the throbbing star-dust atoms danced in pro- 
phecy of Man. 



Who beheld the myriad epochs vanished since the earth 
was born. 

Who beheld from pole to centre the fresh globe con- 
vulsed and torn. 

Who beheld her isles and oceans shifting like the clouds 
of morn ? 

[ S3 ] 



IMMORTAL MIND 

If the angels watched the wonder, 't was as mortal eyes 

behold 
Surf that breaks, or flames outleaping, or the rainbow's 

transient gold: 
None but God saw why or whither the tumultuous ages 

rolled. 

Say not yon unfathomed heavens yield to Man their 

deep decree; 
Say not all-adventuring Science knows what is or what 

shall be. 
Where are alpha and omega.? Who has written, who 

can see? 

Shall the limpet on the sea-cliff pathway o'er the ocean 

find? 
Knows the insect in the sunbeam what far orbs our 

planet bind ? 
Oh! if dust to dust returneth, Man, no less, dies, 

cosmos-blind. 

Is God's glorious work forever witnessed by Himself 

alone ? 
Shall there be no deathless creature standing near th' 

Eternal Throne? 
If one soul be God's companion, — Child of Man, 

why not thine own ? 

[ 54 ] 



HERAKLEITOS 

Through the universe I see 
Movement, rhythm and degree. 
Nothing is but was before 
Something less or something more. 
Wave on wave the starry Hght 
Strikes our fluctuating sight. 
Through the glory of the sun 
Fields of ebbing darkness run. 

Life from life forever breeding, 
Life on life forever feeding, 
Th' invulnerable parasite 
Finds a glory and delight 
Always in some vaster whole: 
As stars of stars receive control, 
And oceans into oceans roll. 

Nothing lives of its own labor. 
Each must borrow of a neighbor. 
Kings by beggars' pence are fed. 
And the serf has daily bread 
Only if the wise and great 
Fructify his mean estate. 

Nature's rapine and decay 
Takes a smooth, melodious way. 
[ 55 ] 



HERAKLEITOS 

See the serpent on the bough 

CoiHng surely, fixing now 

On the dove his jewelled eye, -^ 

Bids her his new pleasures try. 

She in wonder at such wooing. 

Ratifies her own undoing. 

Yields her in a dreamful trance 

To his life-consuming glance, 

Till in her breast with scarce a pang 

Thrusts the worm his glittering fang. 

Soon the eagle with the snake 

His delicious sport will take : 

And through boundless upper air 

The unresisting coiler bear. 

In a rapture of confusion, 

In ecstatical delusion; 

And when on the eagle's eyrie 

Falls the serpent stunned and weary. 

He resigns without a strife 

His short heritage of life. 

Thus by soothing drugs of death 
Nature healeth, fresheneth 
All her tribes, and by such giving 
Maketh short life well worth living; 
While round her ancient, wreckful shore 
Full tides of youth forever pour. 

[ 56 ] 



LAGO DI COMO 

Out of the fight I fled ; yet not 

As cowards fly, but striking at my foe 

With every backward step, and not one jot 

Abating truth and honor, nor with show 

Of courtesy to knaves nor truce with folly. 

But not the less did bitter melancholy 

Go with me ever, and my solitude 

Was haunted by a brood 

Of disillusions, doubts and scornful smiles: 

Seeing how men are ruled by shallow wiles, 

And in the world's high places 

False hearts and hideous faces 

Claim flattery and crowns, 

And over gaping clowns 

Have empire which no power but time effaces ; 

So strong the power of brainless, soulless gold 

By palsied hands controlled ! 

Unto the hills I fled. There at the feet 
Of snowy-mantled summits, the swift tides 
Of joy and pain seemed breaking evermore 
Like foaming ripples beautiful and fleet 
On some impregnable shore 
[ 57 ] 



LAGO DI COMO 

Where land and ocean meet, 

And where in ceaseless conflict peace abides. 

The terraced vineyards and the towered town 

Along the mountain marges sloping down. 

Flooded with purples by Italian eve, 

The castle on the peak, for which the night 

Prepared a holy crown 

Of stars, the sun-smit village gleaming bright, — 

All seemed like cloudy creatures winged for flight. 

Poising a moment to receive 

The gift of air and ecstasy of light. 

The works of man dissolved : or were one beam 

In the supreme effulgence, proud to be 

Transfigured, and to give their passing gleam 

Of beauty to th' eternal joy they see. 

My heart stood still and had no power for tears; 

I felt the lost and lamentable years 

Fall from me like a dream. 

A little mountain maiden with large eyes 

Offered me cyclamens; with smiles she stood, 

The spirit of the springtime and the hills. 

So I smiled with her; and the scornful mood 

Vanished in sunset, as a discord dies 

In vaster music; my remembered ills 

Were but the harmless noise of yonder vale. 

[ 58 ] 



AT A TUSCAN VILLA 

Beneath your villa's ample vines 

I drank your fragrant native wines; 

I heard your cattle low, and saw 

Your faithful servants heed your law. 

It seemed a temperate retreat 

From winter winds and summer's heat. 

Where under smiling Tuscan skies 

It were a pleasure to be wise. 

Such was the house beside the sea 

Of Virgil at Parthenope; 

Such the felicity and charm 

For Horace of his Sabine farm; 

And nobler souls than these have found 

In some sequestered plot of ground 

Room for immortal thoughts, and friends 

To serve imperishable ends. 

Yon uplands of the Apennine 
Have beckoned to a life divine; 
And many a hermit breathing there 
An unperturbed and cloistral air. 
Has found, remote from friends and foes, 
Fulfilment, triumph and repose. 
Not less, old friend, though you and I 
[ 59 ] 



AT A TUSCAN VILLA 

Climb no steep pathway to the sky. 
Mankind compels us to confess 
That cities are a loneliness. 
And bids us oft prefer to these 
Festivity with birds and trees. 
It is because our hearts refuse 
To live unloved, that thus we choose 
To seek among plain folk and rude 
What the spoiled world calls solitude. 



[ 60 ] 



THE DREAM-BUILDER 

A POTENT wizard of forgotten name. 
Whose hut was on a range of sand-blown hills 
Between two towns of ancient Tartary, 
By secret incantation and strong charm 
Could draw men's dreams out from their sleeping brains 
And give them visible shape. Some reached the stars 
And filled the sky's deep dome with golden wings; 
Some earthward clung; while others to and fro 
Would wander in the formless air, like clouds 
Which flock in mountain vales, or on the Sea 
Spread the gray mantle of the mist, that hides 
All else from sight yet shows no shape itself. 

These dreams forthwith, such virtue had the spell. 
Took their own places in the earth and sky, 
Not less than if the finger of the Lord 
Outreaching from the darkness round His throne. 
Had shaped their being when the world was new. 

So from the sand-blown range of treeless hills 
Sprang new-born galaxies, dream after dream. 

Yet all was magic. Uninvited eyes 

Saw nothing. Travellers from their path astray 

[ 61 ] 



THE DREAM-BUILDER 

In that magician's dwelling found a man 

Sunk deep in thought, — no more. Some fancied him 

A penitent in loveless hermitage, 

Self-tortured by his own soul's fixed decree; 

Or madman long forgot, concealing there 

The ruins of his mind, as wounded birds 

Hide dying in dark caves and are not seen. 

Few heard his incantation; few believed 

His magic could call substance from the void; 

Still fewer through his dream-built worlds could move. 

Yet no man wandering through Tartary 

Passed o'er the sand-blown hills, but felt his soul 

Uplifted into freedom and reborn; 

And in the wilderness for many a day 

Each found smooth ways, cool wells and balmy shade, 

And heard the dear speech of his native land. 



[ 62 ] 



RETRO SATHANAS 

I WOKE one night all trembling; a dim beam 
Of moonlight slanted down my chamber-wall; 
But blackness swam about me, and I saw 
Close at my side a shape with human brows, 
Which looked with odious eyes deep, deep in mine 
With pale and beckoning hands, it seemed to say: 
I am a spirit from the waning moon ; 
A thousand days I crouch with half-shut eyes 
On that cold shore where the dull silver fades 
From the mid-crescent into the abyss 
Of shadow stretched between the icy horns. 
Darkness and death are ever where I dwell. 
I am thine own bad angel. I am he 
Who, with what skill the moon-god trained me to. 
Do torture that soft thing within thy breast. 
I vex thy mind with doubts insoluble. 
I lead in mockery beside the edge 
Of soundless gulfs of being, — where below 
Thy human pathway roars the deep of deeps, 
Or where, more terrible than noise of storm. 
The silence seems to make thine own light steps 
Startle the dead abyss with evil sound. 
Before thy mother looked upon thy face, 
I nestled at thy side. I prompted thee 

[ 63 ] 



RETRO SATHANAS 

Through all thy childish, sins; and when in age 
Thy desperate tears flow fast, thy withered face 
Will show among time's honest wrinkles there 
The lines my finger drew. All men who read 
My writing in thy face will shrink from thee : — 
But I will carve it on thee day by day." 

So ceased the phantom. But my angered soul 
Shuddered no whit. I rose; I faced him square, 
And gave him gaze for gaze, with words like these: 
" Good brother demon ! 't was unmannerly 
To break my sleep thus, — though the thing may pass 
If thou art such an old acquaintance here. 
Why is my young soul worth such long-laid plot 
To ruin ? Is thy moon-god in the cold 
So much at loss for ways to spend his power, 
That he must teach thee this industrious trick 
Of netting minnows ? Do I seem so pure. 
Or was I ever so angelical, 
That thy malicious hands befouling me, 
Accomplish some bold insult against God } 
Be not deceived. Old Snake ! For wert thou he 
Who coiled in Eden to sting simple Eve, — 
I tell thee plainly 't is my simple creed 
That souls enslaved by thee were self -betrayed. 
I do defy thy poison-plague to touch 
The clean, sound part of me. O enemy 
Of sickly souls ! I mock thee, when I see 

[ 64 ] 



RETRO SATHANAS 

How good men are, how good is my true self, 

In spite of this perpetual devil's art 

With which thou pliest us. See, spider, see 

The one fly in thy webs, — and through the air 

A million wings flash rainbows in the sun ! 

Such luck is Satan's setting traps for men. 

I call thee thy right name now — do I so ? 

Go, Goat-foot! drop thy large, pretentious style! 

Prince of the Air, art thou, whose royal garb 

So savors of the dung-heap and the ditch ? 

If thou art devil, hear me ! I am man. 

I do defy, deride, exorcise thee. 

I know thou dwellest not in any star. 

Nor in the moon, nor nether deep dost hide. 

Thou art the shadow of my own false fears; 

Thou hast not even the names men call thee by; 

For thou art nothingness and vacancy." 

Then, waking with these words as one from swoon, 

I saw the day-star at my casement shine; 

A silver zone spread round the dawning East, 

And singing through my chamber came a voice: 

" My child, resist the devil, he will flee 

From thee." And all that day was quietness. 



[ 65 ] 



AVE ROMA IMMORTALIS 

Eternal Rome! They change thy robes of pride 
And rend thy beauty from thee, as of old 
Thy women in their mourning tore away 
The vesture from the breast, and let loose hair 
Flow tangled to the wind. Yet of thy soul 
No Vandal, nor thine own unheeding sons. 
Can spoil thee; and the soul of thee survives 
All change and spoliation, — though it be 
The envy of slow time, or sudden hand 
Of unconsidered slaughter that consigns 
Thy body to its doom of endless change. 

Ruin in thee is perfect. Scars of shame. 

Dark prodigies of chastisement and sin. 

Have made themselves thy beauty; and men gaze 

Entranced with fear and wonder that become 

A passionate love of thee. 

Yet all thy shows 
Of visible wreck and glory overthrown 
Are passing ripples in the soundless deep 
Of thy forgotten grief. To mourn for thee. 
Thee and thy fallen kingdoms numberless. 
Is more than tears can do. For loss like thine 

[ 66 ] 



AVE ROMA IMMORTALIS 

Silence alone is fit. Nor needest thou 

The melancholy moon or midnight stars 

To clothe thee in sad thoughts. The brightest noon 

Shows best thy desolation, when the beams 

Of the great, scornful sun shine pitiless 

On the vast profanation of thy graves. 

In youth I pondered with a heavy heart 

On Rome so fallen. With shut eyes I sate 

In silent places, meditating long 

On death, fate, ruin, and all words of woe 

Young hearts still dare to speak. But now I hear 

A song of triumph in the ruins. Now 

For Rome I weep no more; because her soul 

Lives on, and they who love her learn at last 

That if she seem dead, prostrate, overthrown, 

'T is but fantastic vision and untrue. 

I sing an Ave Roma! Soul of Rome, 
Thou art invincible and glad. The streams 
Of thine unnumbered fountains do not flow 
More clear and vital from their mountain caves. 
Than out of shadow speeds thy river of joy 
In haste to feel the sun. Thy children sing 
Right blithely o'er thy vacant sepulchres. 
Or take dry bones for toys. The royal rose 
Thrives well all winter long, amid the mould 
Of Caesar's palaces. Th' Unconquered Sun, 

[ 67 ] 



AVE ROMA IMMORTALIS 

That Sol InvictuSy once a god of thine, 
Has quit us never; and the heart of man 
Renews itself forever in the light 
Of unexhausted heaven. Let the gods 
Die and be buried ! Let their altars fall ! 
O soul of Rome ! O soul of me and mine ! 
We carve the satyr's revel on the stone 
That hides the ashes of the dead — because 
Life is invincible. Rome cannot die. 
Her ruins bloom; her gray, old marble dust 
Is youthful as her violets. 'T is here 
The vestal fires burn forever bright 
Upon the holy hearthstone of mankind. 

Ave Roma Immortalis I We, 

The sons of lamentable chance and change, 

Touching thy wonder-relics, here receive 

Healing and consolation, gifts of power. 

And from thy world-worn heart perpetual song. 

Hear, Rome, our nameless pilgrim prayers, and bless! 

The pilgrims of to-morrow like ourselves 

Will find great peace in thee when we are gone. 



[ 68 ] 



A STOIC'S CREED 

A TRUE man shrinks not from his due of sweat. 
His hard-won virtue is of lofty strain, 
Even and all-subduing: it must grow 
By patient knowledge and discerning art 
To judge, clear-eyed, things human and divine. 
Such is life's end and goal. If thou attain, 
The fellow, not the suppliant, shalt thou be 
Of blessed gods. How reach this pinnacle ? 
Not when thou toilest o'er the Apennine, 
Or through Candavian wilds; no wreckful coast. 
Nor Scylla nor Charybdis, needst thou see; 
Nor buy safe-conduct of marauders bold. 
The way is safe and plain. 'T is Nature's track, 
From which not wandering thou shalt grow divine. 
Divine ! Can gold array thee like a god ? 
Or purple toga.? Lo! the gods are naked. 
Fame hast thou and applause ? Remember, then, 
How God abides unseen, and men blaspheme 
Unpunished. Art thou great and worshipful 
When on thy litter through the staring street 
Thy slaves convey thee ? Yet the highest God 
Bears all things up, unaided and self-moved. 
Seek thou for that which cannot change nor fail ! 
Where ? In thy soul ! Be just, benignant, free ! 

[ 69 ] 



A STOIC'S CREED 

So in thy body a great god shall dwell. 
In slave or freedman or in Roman born 
The soul alone is great. Our names of rank 
Sprang from ambition or injurious deeds. 
Thy only honor, worth and high degree 
Is if a god inhabiteth in thee. 



[ 70 ] 



SENECA ON THE SOUL 

I PRAY thee note how natural it seems 

To send our thoughts out toward the infinite. 

The mind of man loves things of large emprise, 

Accepting for its own no humbler bounds 

Than gods themselves receive. The mind abjures 

A mean and local home. Though thou shouldst 

dwell 
In Alexandria or Ephesus, 
Or some more central city, yet thy mind 
Claims for a fatherland the total sphere. 
Yon round horizon clasping lands and seas, 
Yon middle air and realm of sacred sky 
Dividing and uniting gods and men, 
Where rolls the host of stars which watch our actions. 

Nor will thy mind accept the fatal bounds 
Of fleeting time. For all the past is thine; 
Each epoch gone stands legible and clear. 
Translucent to the peering lamp of reason. 
When comes the day — that day the foolish fear — 
Which separates the god and man within thee. 
Leaving thy body in the dust it sprang from, 
Thou journeyest to the gods, who even now 

[ 71 ] 



SENECA ON THE SOUL 

In this hard earthly prison, bless and cheer. 
Through this short life's delays thou schoolest thee 
To meet the longer, nobler life to come. 

Oh, then what hidden things thy soul shall see ! 

This fog-bank scatters, and from every side 

Light breaks upon thee. Thou shalt contemplate 

That glory of so many mingling stars. 

Streaming together in the tranquil deep 

Of heaven, vs^here no cloud or stain can be. 

Both east and west in heaven look equal bright, 

For light and dark are little changes known 

Only in earthly air. Shalt thou not say. 

When on thy nature the true light shall shine, 

That all thy life was shadow hitherto ? 

Now dost thou but far off and dimly see, 

With eyes of flesh, so feeble and so small; 

But when at last upon thy total self 

The total light shall smite thee through and through, — 

O light of God ! what glory shall it be ! 

Think on these things ! From what is harsh and vile 
They do absolve and purge. Thy life below 
The gods are witness of; and if thou strive 
To make thee worthy their eternal presence, 
No sound of war nor fearful trumpet's blare 
Can shake thee with one fear. To such as thee 
Death is a promise. In thy mortal hour 

[ 72 ] 



SENECA ON THE SOUL 

Thou shalt but break thy chain, and range abroad 

To be forevermore an influence, 

A memory, a goal, a high example, 

A thought of honor in some noble heart. 

Part of thy country's treasure and renown, — 

And all that hear thy voice shall call thee friend. 



r 73 ] 



THE ROXBURY LATIN SCHOOL 

Long may the light our fathers set 
Remain, our glory and our debt, 
And this small field bear harvest yet 

'Neath many a changing star! 
Long may we guard the sacred flame. 
And honor each heroic name. 
And praise the men unknown to fame. 

Who made us what we are ! 

Here Socrates shall smile and die, 
Here Csesar's chariot thunder by. 
Here laurelled Virgil sing and sigh. 

For listeners yet unborn. 
Yet each new age new light shall shed 
Upon the past and all its dead, 
And wisdom with uplifted head 

Face to the rising morn. 

Here youth with eye severely true 
Shall all the paths of glory view. 
And learn what shadows men pursue, 
Then choose its own proud way. 
For something that will ne'er be taught 
In every youthful soul is wrought, 
[ 74 ] 



THE ROXBURY LATIN SCHOOL 

Some free and self -enkindled thought, — 
The best of life's brief day. 

Then dear and hallowed be the house 
Where, with the sunlight on his brows. 
Young Galahad assumes his vows 

And takes the knightly part! 
No need of priestly tapers pale. 
Nor crimson robe nor silvered mail; 
Enough, if to the Holy Grail 

He brings a stainless heart. 



[ 75 ] 



TO OUR OLD HEAD-MASTER 

{William Coe Collar) 

Hail, Guide and Friend ! Our fellow pilgrim now 
Choragus still, despite the silvered head ! 

Pause now, from climbing the hoar mountain's brow. 
And bless the long procession thou hast led ! 

Did Mentor with his wisdom thee invest ? 

Or Chiron lend thee his persuasive lyre? 
Or Socrates, of pedagogues the best, 

Teach thee the harp-strings of a youth's desire ? 

Or at Eleusis didst thou enter in 

To witness what solemnities austere 
Absolve the mystic soul from taint of sin, 

And render to the bright immortals dear? 

Or rather did the legends vast and fair 
Of sage or hero dead, bid thee no less 

Time's new occasions grasp, and so prepare 
Thy followers the age unborn to bless ? 

Not thine the blood-bought glory and applause 
The martial trumpets of their heroes tell. 

Who one brief day upheld their country's cause. 
Or one wild hour withstood her foemen well. 

[ 76 ] 



TO OUR OLD HEAD-MASTER 

Not thine the laurels mixed with mortal yew 
Of melancholy genius, which would drive 

Some vast thought to excess, till all but few 
Lose in the vacuous height the wings to strive. 

All thy long life was service. Thy free sword 
Struck like ^Eneas at a phantom brood 

Of falsehoods, fevered thoughts, and shapes abhorred 
Which war against the spirit's lasting good. 

Like fond Prometheus thou didst chiefly love 
To mould firm shapes of men, and set them free 

With touch of heavenly fire; yet jealous Jove 
Frowned not, I deem, but lent high help to thee. 

lo triumphel Let thy triumph find 

Something more sweet than praise to crown the strife ! 
See, second sire ! these children of thy mind ! 

Fame is a ghost, a shadow. Love is life. 

If aught in monument our age survive. 
Not only of the strugglers in the glare 

Of the gross world, who for fierce conquest strive. 
But of those habitants of upland air 

Who feed the springs of life, whereof mankind 
Must ever drink, — if this be lasting fame, — 

Then, friend, for whom our grateful hands have twined 
This garland of a night — long lives thy name. 

[ 77 ] 



INDEPENDENCE DAY 

Blood of the blond sea-rovers and fierce, black moun- 
tain-men, 
Mixed with a home-bred lowland race that fished in 

river and fen, — 
Such wild, red blood had England's youth, and it has 

not cooled since then. 



Rovers ever the race has bred, as all the world may 

know. 
But never a hearth like England's hearth so faithfully 

doth glow. 
And every clime where men can breathe has English 

homes to show. 



Out of the sea the New World rose ; and many a brave 

ship flew 
To plant old England's freedom there and bid it bloom 

anew. 
Till fruit for every race it bore, and great and greater 

grew. 

[ 78 ] 



INDEPENDENCE DAY 

Rovers out of the whole wide world poured in the land 

to fill; 
They yoked a continent with steel, broke monsters to 

their will, 
And wrought new things beneath the sun, with sinewy, 

scornful skill. 

Blithe was the new-born race of men. The lords of 

memory 
They met with mocking, or forgot; and under the 

vaster sky 
Did what they would or what they could, letting old 

falsehoods die. 

Many a race learned English speech, and under the 

flag of stars 
All free-born blood was mingled new and offered in 

holy wars 
To win for Man his manhood true, whatever the cost 

of scars. 

'T was well for England's freedom and well for the 

hopes of Man, 
That the New World race from the mother race drew 

off an ocean-span. 
Yet are we all one brotherhood, according to God's 

plan. 

[ 79 ] 



TO JAPAN VICTORIOUS 

Land of flowers, land of fire, 

Of lava mountains and of azure seas ! 

Weaving webs of delicate desire. 

Imperial lady on a throne 

Of golden lotos, thou didst sit alone 

Watching the centuries, 

As one whose life was but a dream or song, 

While oft thy giant foes feared not to do thee wrong. 

But all thy beauty clothed a soul of flame; 

Thy cold and calm were like the glittering snows 

On Fuji's smouldering crest; 

For treasured in thy breast 

Was energy that never knew repose; 

Thy princes went and came. 

Each with two swords, and terribly possessed 

The art to die for honor, freedom, fame. 

Light-hearted Europe — a barbaric boy — 
Bought of thee many a toy; 
And for the knick-knacks taught thee to employ 
More horrible and swifter ways to slay; 
Harnessed thee lightnings and the seas subdued; 

[ 80 ] 



TO JAPAN VICTORIOUS 

Bade thee go cast thy gods of calm away, 
And joining Europe's unforgetful feud, 
Fight off thy foes with fire, like thy brood 
Of air-born dragons in Earth's primal day. 

Now are the dragon's teeth upon thee sown. 

Around thy fields of blood our plaudits roar. 

Thou art become as one of us ! We own 

Death, earth's old arbiter, our friend once more. 

For lo ! when thou didst launch, with well-poised hand. 

Thy new forged thunderbolt upon that land 

Where throne and people were alike in thrall, — 

Behold the mockery crumbled ! At thy call 

From their blind-eyed repose 

The tortured bondmen rose; 

And like a blood-red banner bright, 

A vast volcanic light 

Streams out of chaos round the thrones of wrong; 

While with fraternal song 

The free-born lands acclaim thy victory won : 

"Hail to our Sister of the Rising Sun!" 

O bleeding, but invincible, arise! 

Pour forth more fire across the morning skies 

To quicken, to consume. 

Fruitful of doom. 

Kindling with death the glory 

Of new immortal story! 

[ 81 ] 



TO JAPAN VICTORIOUS 

Set the slave free ! 

Burn off from land and sea 

All that is fed on blood or bloody gold ! 

Save thee, our Sister! Save thy lands and ours 

From ogres crowned with flowers, 

From clamorous vulture-powers. 

By whom our wailing world is half controlled, 

While snares of steel and fire their naked victims hold. 

Then, Sister, take once more 

Upon thy blossoming shore 

Thy throne of beauty on the Lotos pure; 

And with heroic heart. 

Achieve with us the art 

Of truth that shall endure, 

Of balm all plagues to cure. 

Of popular will subdued 

To sovereign peace and good. 

Till for late harvest our terrestrial ball 

Bear brotherhood for all. 



[ 82 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

{Delivered before the ^ B K at Harvard^ June, 1894) 

Long is the story of a ripening star; 

And if her sages guess their riddle true, 

Our green Earth tarries in the tender bud, 

Involving precious issues unforeseen 

Save this — her fruit is Man. For him, the storm 

Scarred the lone peak, and lashed the barren sea; 

For him the planet, in her cloudy prime. 

Endured the slow plasticity of life, 

Mere mindless gemmules, gross fecundity. 

Fierce joys of motion, shock of foe with foe. 

And ecstasies of stimulated sense; 

For him great Nature through all creatures poured 

Bacchantic drops of madness and desire. 

Which unto canticles of passion strange 

Surged on and on, until the rhapsody 

Burst the dim dreams of sense; then stirred the Soul 

Its wings in happy air; then wisdom woke. 

And love found words ; then looked the heavens on Man, 

Emerging from his chrysalis the brute, — 

Child of the Dust and Master of the World ! 

These miracles, like music whose full close 
The patient prelude justifies, prepared 

[ 83 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

More signs and wonders. For then seemed to cease 
New fashions of the fleshly instrument, 
And Soul, henceforth contented to possess 
Man's body as the utmost flesh can do, 
Put forth intrinsic gifts. 

The art of words. 
First sign and vehicle of brotherhood. 
Supplanted the old, helpless monotones. 
And on remembered syllables of power 
Saved each man's truth for all. The truth-taught hand 
Shaped the hard flint, the mammoth brute subdued. 
Or seizing flame, — a half-celestial sword, — 
Conquered all climes, and on the kindly hearth. 
Found for the Sun a new vicegerent god, 
More exorable. So Man's kingdom grew 
Along vast rivers, and o'er islands green, 
Till in the chronicle of times forgot, 
His angel-tribe o'erran the flnished globe; 
For after him the seas broke bound no more. 
And mountains moved not o'er the nether fire. 

Then rose a man-made world. The willing stone 
Soared into forms of worshipped loveliness; 
Sweet music borrowed from the choral stream 
Of Nature's unrestrained iEolian airs 
What best could flow in tempered melody, 
In dear, consenting numbers, oft renewed. 
The Poets then began : their mighty dreams 

[ 84 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

Repeopled land and sea with shapes of gods, 

The eldest progeny of soul from soul. 

For Man's first god was his first dream of good. 

The disembodied glory of his mind 

In far-off clouds confining. By such prayers 

The soul was taught to feel its noblest powers 

Not self -begotten, not of mortal name. 

But from the central orb of wonder born. 

And all-creative Love, that cannot die. 

So Man's long childhood passed. The wonder was 
How rainbow fancies guided truth so well. 
And false Hesperides, or Fleece of Gold, 
To genuine treasures lured. Slowly, at last. 
Out of a chaos of dim dreams arose 
The sphere of Knowledge, — separable, firm, — 
Knowledge in demonstrable light displayed, 
Man's one sure standing-ground above the chasm 
And fathomless abyss beside his way. 

5ach mighty people some new province won 
From dreams and darkness to the realms of light. 
The labyrinthine secrets multiplied 
And passed in heritage from race to race: 
Beneath the snow-topped Himalayan wall. 
In far Cathay, or on the Phrygian hills. 
Or 'mid the Babylonian multitude. 
Or shadowed shrines of immemorial Nile, 

[ 85 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

The sons of light in nameless wisdom toiled, 
Till Athens laughed at Asia's priestly awe, 
Turned her firm forehead to the gods of dawn. 
Achieved for Europe's infancy the dower 
Of liberated reason, — then bequeathed 
To new-born nations her immortal name. 

Mighty the host of men who lived and died 

To conquer truth; but father of them all 

Prometheus was, whose dole of stolen fire 

So shook the skies, and touched Man's drowsy clay 

With such celestial spark, that since his hour 

Heaven keeps no secret long. 

Age after age 
Such wanderers widen our small world for us. 
Dim stars, but true, resistless draw them on 
To find that glory just outside the dark. 
The half- won truth men guessed but dared not know; 
And God's best gift to Liberty it is. 
To be a fruitful mother of such sons. 

So rises an eternal House of Truth, 
For Man to live in and make beautiful; 
Strong arch on arch is built, and founded deep 
Below the shifting sands of childish guess, 
Its solid towers outwatch the annual stars. 

Oh, strange, imperial fate! Not from the stars 
Falls now the charter of Man's destinies. 

[ 86 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

His glorious horoscope himself he draws. 
Where'er his mind is on its throne, set free 
From sluggish customs of the troglodyte. 

Now hath our busy race that labored so 

Its mere first foothold on this star to prove. 

To higher tasks arrived. For sovereign sway 

Profits but little, till the Conqueror 

Surround his throne with chivalry and song; 

And Man, earth's Lord and King, must keep his 

crown 
By beauty, virtue, and fair courtesies. 
And o'er his brows white, royal jewels wear 
Of stainless truth, clear faith and steadfast will. 
With love's great ruby flaming over all. 



Through the doleful past no more 
Peer with fond and fearful look ! 
Earth hath sealed that record-book 
Of the guests she housed before; 
Her hospitable board is spread 
For the living, not the dead. 
O that the golden Muse of Song 
Might her old, old runes forget, 
And find a race of singers strong 
To break her Libyan reed, her Doric shell. 
And in more potent numbers tell 
A music never vocal yet ! 
[ 87 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

Oh, that her heaven-glancing eye 
Looked no more on Memory! 



Say not earth was born too soon, 
Like her pale, sequacious moon ! 
Not racked with age is this old earth. 
All her throes are throes of birth. 
All the secrets that she knows 
She lavished on her last-blown rose. 

Too long we blamed the barren field. 

Too long the winds accused, 

The world we live in stands revealed 

Exhaustless, but unused ! 

Yet he who curbs the lightning's force 

Sweats drudging at his wheel ; 

His art foretells the comet's course. 

Whose own the Fates conceal. 

But say not Man, the ages' heir. 
Of his primal force can fail, — 
Or receiveth an entail 
Of decrepitude, despair ! 
Oft the reengendered race 
Will improve th' ancestral place. 
Renovate the mansion old. 
And statelier revels hold. 
[ 88 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

Freshly from the burning sun 

Speeds the free ethereal fire. 

In each new-born life to run, 

Flaming high in son as sire; 

Man's blest blood and quality 

Was not of his fathers bred; 

Son of the round-world is he, 

And his good health is nourished 
By confluence of every wind and sea. 
By stars no eye hath seen. 
By all the Past hath been, 
And by the powers not yet begun to be. 

Already dawns the gifted, golden time 
To heaven-instructed seer and sibyl known. 
When conquering quite the monsters of the prime 
Man shall be man indeed, 
And serving human need 
Hold an unshaken throne 
O'er all false gods and tyrants of an hour. 
O'er plague and famine, wrath and crime. 
Omnipotent in peaceful power. 

The waves by exiles crossed. 
Though loudly still the ocean-thunders roll. 

Their ancient power have lost 
To stop the speech of yearning soul with soul; 
No island in the tropic seas 
Looks at the sun in solitude; 

[ 89 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

They signal on the conscious breeze 
The island-brotherhood. 

Some future wizard will control 
That cold aurora of the sunless pole; 
O'er the Alps his station take, 
Of the earth his magnet make, 
Touch a key, and master so 
The universal dynamo 
To turn a wheel, or tell a story. 
Flood the midnight sea with glory, 
Or flash across a thousand miles 
The sunlight in a lover's smiles. 
Then where'er an exile roam. 
Love will always be at home. 

But outcasts with a heavy heart 
Will cross strange lands as lost stars drop through 
space, 
Where every eye may trace 
The pathway of their fall. 

A vast Arachne, the electric art 

Will fold in glittering web this planetary ball.^ 

Then shall no nation wear 
A glory none may share; 
But each shall publish to the world its best, 
^ Written before Marconi's invention. 
[ 80 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

Each ask of all the rest 

Glad interchange of treasures or delight; 
And all will have more might 
If one grows strong; for strength will then incite, 
Not envy or pretence, 
Not hedge-hog self-defence. 
But emulation in true excellence; 
And no man then will try a hostile blow 
On aught but circumstance, his oft-revanquished foe. 



Each land another's grief shall feel ! ^ 

As ever in thy woe or weal, 
France! unto thee all free-born hearts are kin; 
But chiefly ours, who caught the sacred flame 
Of liberty from thy prophetic song. 
And watched with thee when freedom's morn came in. 
" O Liberty, what crimes are in thy name ! " 
What prodigies of wrong! 

Like Dion, fallen in a festal hour. 
With palm and laurel o'er his bosom crossed. 
Lies that pure chieftain, to his people lost. 
But not to glory, or his country's fame. 

Oft had he put to shame 
The sensual traffickers in power; 
No tinselled soldier he. 
Of braggart chivalry! 
^ The body of President Carnot then lay in state. 
[ 91 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

No borrower of mighty names outworn! 

A patriot's duty such as he fulfil 

By fruitful industry at eve and morn. 

By resolute and ever loyal will, 

And reconcile, by many-counselled light, 

The public good with clamorous private right. 

We praise thee, France, that such a noble son 
Fell not by rival, nor his own rash mind. 
Nor by compatriot-stroke undone. 
But by a frenzied foe of all mankind. 

We, who twice, since our wild grief of war. 
Have heard a nation's dirges toll. 
Twice arrayed the sable-trophied car — 
Thy sister-sorrow strikes us to the soul ! 
Too well we know, not yet appears the day 
When Liberty may cast her shield away. 



Man against his brothers striving. 
Sang triumphal songs in vain. 
Nobler contests are arriving. 
Battles without hate or pain. 

Let the captains of to-day 
Lead their men to bloodless fray! 
Inspire the rank and file with generous faith ! 
Not liveried for the tasks of death. 
But ever o'er a calmer world 

[ 92 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

Their federating flag unfurled, 
Lead on the legions of the free, 
Not to shield the crimes of thrones, 
Not to lacquey royal drones. 
But to fulfil the dear behest 
Of light-uplifting Liberty — 
Star-crowned Colossus of the West! 

Already from the Future's purple cloud 

A vast, dim shape looms clear, 
It is Cosmopolis, a city proud, 
Not bounded by what limit man may draw. 
But only by the round earth's atmosphere. 
To either pole, her sacred speech and law 

Shall give decree. 
Her suburbs are the islands of the sea. 
Her hanging gardens from the Andes crown 
To equatorial valleys sloping down. 
To solace her cold Northern citizens — ■ 

Who haply, on their ships of air. 

In sultry June will idly fare 
Through clouds, above the green Siberian fens. 

We know not how Man's life shall look 
In that World-City; scarce our dreams may brook 
The beauty and delight of times unborn. 
And far from ours as Europe's glacial morn, 
God who protecteth man 
[ 93 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

From dizzying view of things too vast and far. 

Diminishes the future's star 
To one white beam of hope within the sky, 
Which we may travel by ! 

But one clear truth we know : 
However huge Man's world may grow, 
The mother in her babe will see 
A universe of mystery, 
Love, in love's replying eyes. 
Meet perennial surprise. 
And the circumference of the starry whole 
Find centre in each human soul. 

For God made not His world for naught. 
Nor to a creature did resign 
Co-regency with star-enkindling thought. 
That one more soulless orb among His hosts should 
shine. 

Man did not get his planet for a toy. 
By spendthrift folly to despoil 
The fabric of Ionian toil, — 
But that the choral seas and skies 
With his own heart should harmonize 
In antiphones of praise and joy! 
Man's terrestrial primacy 
Is a symbol eloquent, 

[ 94 ] 



THE MAKING OF MAN 

That omnipotence can be 

Not in powers we touch and see. 

Our earth-born dust of Deity partakes, 
Only when th' interior spirit breaks 

The sleep of dust's captivity, 

And with illuminating love. 
Rules the sphere, as God his spheres above 

In self-forgetful sovereignty. 



[ 95 ] 



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